Guess how many HCR questions there were at the OH town hall on Friday?

Edited on Mon Jan-25-10 02:05 PM by BeyondGeography

None. Zero. Not one. Everything was job- and economy-related. Obama began and ended with prepared remarks on health care. Everyone listened politely and then focused on the thing that's really on their mind.

It's Monday morning quarterbacking, but our health care system is a huge, unworkable Rube Goldberg contraption that has swallowed the last two Democratic presidencies whole. Even scaled-down versions of reform are difficult to attain. Want to eliminate non-coverage for pre-existing conditions? Then you've got to find a way for the for-profit insurers to make up the difference (i.e. 30 million new federally subsidized insured people). Which leads to the big government charge on the Right and charges of selling out tho the insurance companies on the Left. Reform can't be meaningful if it's modest, as all the dysfunctional beast parts are related. There is no consensus in how to proceed, even within the Democratic Party, and on and on and on it goes. This when the main concern facing most people is their economic security, not the way they feel physically when they wake up in the morning.

So I'm starting to agree with Robert Kuttner:

...as I wrote in Obama's Challenge, in August 2008, it would be a huge mistake to try to get health care done right out of the box. Obama first needed to get his sea-legs, and focus like a laser on economic recovery. If he got the economy back on track, he would then have earned the chops to undertake more difficult structural reforms like health care.

HCR is unpopular on all political fronts right now, plus it's not what most people care about first and foremost. Reform Wall Street, sell the benefits of continued stimulus and government investment. Revisit trade policies. Roll back the accumulation of corporate power wherever possible. Roll back the Bush tax cuts in the name of fiscal responsibility. Protect the ability of the middle class to send their children to college. The economy, stupid, non-stop until 2012, and contrast your policies with those of the Republicans as much as possible. HCR became a 2nd term issue with the loss in MA. The sooner we realize that, the more likely it is there will be a second term.

Still, it was a weird bit of dissonance. Selling HCR to people who were primarily interested in something else. A jarring format for a shaken President. And, even though it was a crowd of friendlies, they were not noticeably enthused by the bill. A fairly good presentation of what has happened to the President and to the Democratic Party after focusing on HCR for the better part of a year.

but I read somewhere the other day that makes sense: If you suddenly throw 30 million (or more) people into the insurance system, that creates an immediate need for (x number) of doctors. Where do they come from all of a sudden? That got me thinking. I haven't found an answer yet...

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